Living to a ripe old age and maintaining a editable quality of life at a ripe old age are two different things. In my opinion optimal human nourishment includes regular consumption of animal flesh.

that's not a matter of opinion, though. the best we can say is we have a vague picture of what 'optimal' human nourishment resembles, but it's fuzzy and not the same for everyone anyway. there is a growing consensus that vegetarian diets lead to better long term health outcomes.

for most people, therefore, the 'quality of life' factors are aesthetic/sensory rather than health-related; meat is a nutritionally-convenient source of protein, iron, vitamin b12 etc., but hardly the only option. it just tastes better than the alternatives, so people are understandably reluctant to give it up even if they feel bad about animal deaths being an unavoidable part of the process. i get that. my point was simply that a preference is not in the same category of ethical justification as survival.

(i agree with you that this is a continuum rather than a binary, but i'm defining 'survival' as something along the lines 'you get sick and die without it' or 'you have no other sources of food' – i.e., it is preference-agnostic.)

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Originally Posted by vixnix

Whether or not instransitive gratitude is misplaced, I still feel it. You claimed I couldn't feel gratitude in that instance. I disagree, I think intransitive gratitude is a fairly widespread phenomenon. It doesn't require the consent of an object because it's not directed at one. It could be part of a survival mechanism that allowed us to form and emotional connection to our environment, which motivated us to take better care of it, this enhance our chances of survival. Many subsistence/environmentally sustainable traditional cultures have thanksgiving rituals where the thanks they have for their harvest, spoils of hunt/ agriculture are given thanks for and I don't see a reason to suspect the gratitude is not real.

i never said you didn't feel it. i said the feeling was misplaced and suggested that it was potentially destructive.

to give you another example, consider the gratitude routinely expressed by political leaders for the 'sacrifices' soldiers make by dying in combat.

now, those soldiers and their families deserve respect, absolutely, but is gratitude really the right reaction? i mean, the situations in which those deaths occur arguably arise from the interaction of a multitude of inordinately complicated systems: the military-industrial complex, nation-building political narratives motivated by xenophobia and energy security, an uncritical or complicit media that regurgitates propaganda to a working class systematically kneecapped by a laissez-faire capitalist economy that increasingly accrues wealth to the wealthy, etc. etc.

i don't offer that as an analogy, just as an example of misplaced 'intransitive' gratitude. if it encourages complacency when further action would otherwise be deemed necessary, it's easy to see how it's a bad thing, right? it makes it easier to explain away problematic processes that happen to benefit us, and uncritically preserve the status quo.

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Originally Posted by vixnix

As for the non sequitur, the validity of that is tied up with the question of nutrition. If I didn't need to eat meat to maintain optimal condition I would consider giving it up because of the regret I feel. That isn't the case for me. I continue to eat meat because I think it is good for me and I am self interested - at the same time, I'm compassionate enough to feel regret about my own fairly un changeable nature.

i don't know how to read this. you're resistant to change so you'd rather not bother with self-reflection?

i don't know how to read this. you're resistant to change so you'd rather not bother with self-reflection?

I'm of Polynesian descent, the traditional diet includes regular intakes animal protein. Polynesians have consumed that diet for thousands of years and over that period I think it's likely that the survivors are the ones who were best adapted to it.

The wikipedia article you linked to lists a number of boutique grain products that have not been successfully commercially cultivated outside of their native environments, which is why places like Peru now grow huge amounts of a grain that was previously a staple, for export - they can barely afford to buy it, themselves. They eat imported junk. Rice is the same - the widespread cultivation of rice is a contributor to deforestation and has similar implications as it does for the Peruvians, for those who grow it as a cash crop.

Humans are mostly omnivores - and we've adapted to be omnivores because most environments it is the most sensible and sustainable diet, IMO. It doesn't make it the nicest diet, in terms of how we interact with our environment - but in terms of surviving as a group - I think it is the most sensible and sustainable diet.

I'm of Polynesian descent, the traditional diet includes regular intakes animal protein. Polynesians have consumed that diet for thousands of years and over that period I think it's likely that the survivors are the ones who were best adapted to it.

APPEAL TO TRADITION; CITATION NEEDED

Quote:

Originally Posted by vixnix

The wikipedia article you linked to lists a number of boutique grain products that have not been successfully commercially cultivated outside of their native environments, which is why places like Peru now grow huge amounts of a grain that was previously a staple, for export - they can barely afford to buy it, themselves. They eat imported junk. Rice is the same - the widespread cultivation of rice is a contributor to deforestation and has similar implications as it does for the Peruvians, for those who grow it as a cash crop.

NON SEQUITUR

Quote:

Originally Posted by vixnix

Humans are mostly omnivores - and we've adapted to be omnivores because most environments it is the most sensible and sustainable diet, IMO. It doesn't make it the nicest diet, in terms of how we interact with our environment - but in terms of surviving as a group - I think it is the most sensible and sustainable diet.

If we're talking about a diet that enables survival, sustainability is part of that conversation. Claiming that we don't need to eat meat to stay alive because we can rely on plains of quinoa and rice to sustain us instead, is problematic if your bottom line is survival...climate change and peak oil are both going to affect a diet dependent on protein rich crops.

There are no studies that I'm aware of - Polynesians are a small group of humans, population-wise. That, and their long period of isolation from other human cultures means that interest in their traditions and diet is limited.

The main source for Samoans that I know is An Account of Samoan History up to 1918 by Teo Tuvale.

In it he writes:

For one meal: 1 pound of baked taro, one or two breadfruit averaging three quarters of a pound in weight, half a pound of fish, 3 papasami [sic], half a pound of pork and in addition anything else that can be procured or is prepared. This is usually followed by the juice of a cocoanut [sic]. If available the above foods and amounts will be consumed twice a day as the Samoan's digestive capacity seems to be limited only by his ability to procure the food or have it procured for him. The above foods and quantities have been checked several times from personal observation and should the amount consumed at a feast be mentioned one would be liable to be put down as a liar.

There are theories that to sail from one island to another, the convoy was often out at sea for long periods of time - so natural selection favoured those who were able to eat everything that was available, when it was made available, and store it preceding a long stretch of low calorie and fluid intake.

If we're talking about a diet that enables survival, sustainability is part of that conversation. Claiming that we don't need to eat meat to stay alive because we can rely on plains of quinoa and rice to sustain us instead, is problematic if your bottom line is survival...climate change and peak oil are both going to affect a diet dependent on protein rich crops.

not sure how meat production is sustainable when it's about 20% responsible for greenhouse gas emissions.....